Simson Alexander David

Simson Alexander David , also Simon Alexander David , pseudonyms: Alexander Daveson and Carl Julius Lange , (born November 16, 1755 in Braunschweig , † late 1812 or early 1813, presumably in Minsk ) was a German publicist, businessman (lottery collector, art and clothing dealer ), Travel writer, journalist , censor in the pay of the French occupation troops (from October 1806), councilor (since 1807) and civil participant in Napoleon's Russian campaign (1812).

Caricature from 1808/09 of Simson Alexander David (Karl Julius Lange), shown here as a collaborator in a French uniform in Berlin. Such humiliations were sold in large numbers.

Life

Origin and youth

Simson was born on November 16, 1755 as the tenth and youngest child of the Brunswick court and chamber agent Alexander David and his second wife Deborah Siemons. Already in his youth, the spoiled and rich heir, like his brothers, stood out for a lavish lifestyle. In vain was a guardian appointed to prevent the frivolity and inexperience of the chamber agent's sons from being exploited by business people. Having come of age, Simson (also: Samson) Alexander David tried himself as an art and haberdashery dealer (he called himself Alexander Daveson) since 1778. He sold u. a. physical devices such as electrifying machines. In addition, he was the official collector of the Hessian lottery for the Braunschweig area. In connection with this activity he was accused by the Hessian authorities of infidelity and fraud in April 1779. 43 people were allegedly involved in the scandal. The two-year investigation revealed no evidence of any wrongdoing by David. Nevertheless, he was imprisoned because he had been a thorn in the side of Duke Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel for a long time. The political background for this was David's close relationship with the Duke's father, Charles I , who had completely shattered the state finances through his waste. David had been one of the suppliers of jewels for mistresses and had behaved boldly towards the throne who insisted on thrift. Three weeks after the death of Charles I (March 26, 1780), David was arrested, officially because of the lottery affair, but actually because the new duke wanted to take revenge and the Brunswick authorities feared that he would be able to flee abroad with large amounts of cash ( Leipzig Fair).

Friendship with Lessing

The prominent poet and journalist Gotthold Ephraim Lessing was convinced of David's innocence, visited him in prison, fought for his release and finally took him in in Wolfenbüttel . Lessing is said to have benefited greatly from David's still good financial circumstances. The poet died "in the arms" of David. In a letter dated December 19, 1780 Lessing recommended David expressly to his friend Moses Mendelssohn : "He wants nothing from you, dear Moses, other than that you suggest the shortest and safest route to the European country, where there are no Christians , there are still Jews. I don't like to lose it ... ".

Travels and beginnings as an author

Immediately after Lessing's death (February 15, 1781), David went on a journey and lived for a long time in England , where he said he studied language and culture with Samuel Johnson and was a frequent spectator in the British Parliament. This cannot be proven due to the lack of written sources. In addition, he probably also worked as a tutor, possibly with the noble Whitehouse family. In the summer of 1790 David returned to Germany under the name Karl Julius Lange (he had been baptized in England). Here he often changed his whereabouts and traveled through northern Germany as a specialist and reciter for English literature and culture (he acquired the title of professor). On October 30, 1790, he failed a much-heralded evening of recitation ("Attic entertainment") at the Hamburger Schauspielhaus because he obviously satirized rather than imitated the British star actors and parliamentary speakers of the time. In Braunschweig he was more successful with it. The Duke, who once put him in prison, is said to have given him a warm welcome, paid for his stay and given him plenty of presents. In 1790/91 David held lectures in English literary history in Hanover, went to Vienna in 1792 (including work for the Wiener Zeitung ) and traveled through Switzerland in 1793 . From 1794 he processed his experiences in a two-volume, very critical book ( Die Schweiz und die Schweizer ), which appeared anonymously and caused a sensation in Switzerland. It was banned in Basel because of its radical democratic tendencies. David wrote the book in Schweinfurt , where he had appeared as a "Braunschweiger Professor" since April 20, 1795 and had rented an expensive apartment. He had married the daughter of a respected Bayreuth official, Caroline Schunter, and saw himself as a "privatizing scholar". The fact that he was often on the road aroused the suspicion of the Schweinfurters. In 1795 David applied in vain to Schiller to work on the Horen , although Alexander von Humboldt had written a letter of recommendation. Even a contact with Christoph Martin Wieland and his New German Merkur, along with an obviously short stay in Weimar, does not seem to have brought David the long-awaited contact with the great men of intellectual life there. When the French troops entered Schweinfurt in 1796, David worked as an interpreter and negotiator on behalf of the Schweinfurt city council and therefore had to allow himself to be insulted as a "spy". Whether David offered himself to the French General Jean-Baptiste Jourdan as an "informant" in Schweinfurt is just as unclear as the question of whether he was already active as a scout under General Adam-Philippe de Custine . Both were asserted by David's opponents, but not proven. There is a letter from Jourdan himself in which he speaks of a "Maitre de Langue" (language master, interpreter) who has received a French passport in gratitude for services rendered. What is certain is that David left Schweinfurt after a few days with generous financial help from the city and went to the less restless Bayreuth.

Karl Julius Lange at the stake - caricature from Berlin, ca.1807

Editor of the Deutsche Reichs- und Staatszeitung

At the end of 1796, at the invitation of the Nuremberg publisher Ernst Christoph Grattenauer , David devoted himself to a new newspaper project, the Deutsche Reichs- und Staatszeitung , which came out with the active support of the "conducting minister" of Ansbach-Bayreuth , Karl August von Hardenberg, and a sharply anti-Austrian tendency would have. Hardenberg used David's talents for his (secret) press policy and held his protective hand over the journalist when complaints were received several times about the newspaper's emphatically critical, radically liberal reporting. a. from the German aristocracy, the Russian and Austrian courts. Observers were surprised that such a "free-thinking", liberal newspaper could appear in Prussia. The exact place of printing (Nuremberg, later Erlangen) and his responsibility were kept secret by Hardenberg from his Berlin superiors. In 1798 came the irregularly appearing journal Latest State Studies. A journal for regents and peoples was added. In May 1799, David was arrested under pressure from the Austrian court because he had claimed that the Kaiser had ordered the murder of French envoys at the Rastatt Congress . Although the rumors were plausible, the newspaper had to be closed despite Hardenberg's protection. After an initial brief imprisonment, David managed to escape to Göttingen, he returned voluntarily, was arrested again, and finally fled to Altona (then Denmark) on November 30, 1799, where he was again active as a journalist ( Hamburg and Altona magazine , 1801 ), but suffered from increasingly difficult financial circumstances. His family had grown to five children. David was at odds with Hamburg publishers and was persecuted by creditors. He therefore lived temporarily in the village of Neumühlen near Altona, and later in Helmstedt . Hardenberg secretly sent money and tried to shorten David's trial, but it wasn't until Christmas 1803 that the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm III struck. the procedure down. David's dream of a permanent position in the civil service turned out to be utopian.

Editor of the Telegraph

After several unsuccessful journalistic projects and occasional work for August von Kotzebue's magazine Der Freimüthige , David moved to Berlin at the beginning of 1804, published various, all of them short-lived, papers and applied to the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm III in autumn 1806 . again the license for a daily newspaper. This license was granted to him because the Prussian authorities promised David a combative propaganda sheet. The Telegraph first appeared on October 17, 1806, at a time when Prussia was being defeated by the French under Napoleon I in the double battle of Jena and Auerstedt. After a first issue in the spirit of Prussian hurray patriotism ("Everything is big, unusual, colossal ..."), David changed political lines as early as the second edition of the Telegraph , initially cautiously waiting and proposing in his formulations In the days that followed, he sided entirely with the French, an attitude that corresponded to his basic democratic convictions and which he maintained until the paper was discontinued in 1808. As the first and only daily newspaper in Berlin (and Germany!), The Telegraph became the semi-official mouthpiece of the French, read throughout Europe, who kept Berlin occupied. Napoleon I personally wrote in an instruction to his then police chief Bignon on October 31, 1806 that "this individual, if he behaves well, should receive a pension and a place of residence in France after the withdrawal of the army" David, who since Cooperation with Hardenberg was used to being active in propaganda, inevitably accepted the "offer" and violently attacked the dark side of the Prussian monarchy. In semi-official texts of the telegraph , Queen Luise was also criticized, of whom it is said that she was badly hit by the unusually clear attacks. With his critical assessment of "old" Prussia and its rigid administrative and military structures, David was by no means alone at the time, and it stands to reason that he expressed this opinion not only because the French paid and protected him for it, but because he was protected by was always a revolutionary-minded, enlightened contemporary.

David is considered one of the first political (opinion) journalists in Germany, was characterized by wit, "opposition spirit" and democratic convictions, but as the editor of the Telegraph was undoubtedly completely under the influence and wages of the French occupiers. For this he was attacked so much in Berlin that at times he was only able to work under the protection of soldiers. He is considered to be the co-founder of the term emancipation , a word he used for example. B. applied to the Catholics in Ireland who were then fighting for their recognition in Protestant England.

On January 1, 1807, David was given the title of "Princely Isenburg Court Counselor", an honor that was doubtful, as Prince Carl von Isenburg-Birstein was considered a passionate admirer of Napoleon, raised an army of Prussian deserters and was accordingly hated by German patriots . On December 3, 1808, David left Berlin, first went with the retreating French to the fortress of Stettin, where the telegraph was not continued contrary to original announcements, and in January came to Erfurt, to the headquarters of the French Marshal Davout . Napoleon wrote in a letter to his police minister Fouché on January 13, 1809, that Lange should continue to publish the telegraph in Erfurt for a while and then move to Düsseldorf in order to agitate against the Austrian newspapers in Vienna and Pressburg from there . However, the telegraph no longer appeared. Instead, David supervised the German newspapers for the French, wrote some dossiers that the occupiers considered unusable, and so on. a. via the Bamberger Zeitung , which was then looked after by Hegel .

Late years and death in Russia

Little is known about David's exact activities up to his death (probably as early as late autumn 1812). Apparently he worked for some time as a "literary visiter", that is, chief censor and press monitor on the staff of French Marshal Davout. In Erfurt, David is said to have lived on a large scale and to have attracted attention due to his lavish lifestyle. A carriage had to be ready for him day and night. The French Minister of War Henri Clarke d'Hunebourg considered David "unconfident" and useless as a press superintendent or secret agent. In the spring of 1811 David moved in the wake of Davout to Hamburg, where the publisher Friedrich Christoph Perthes considered him a "secret superior" of the censorship authority. However, David was expelled after a short time because he had forged promissory notes and passed them off as documents of Marshal Davout in order to get money. David then reported an unknown woman to the French secret police. In the summer of 1811 David lived in Offenbach, the residence of Prince Carl von Isenburg, and in Frankfurt / Main . In the Allgemeine Anzeiger der Deutschen of September 15, 1811, he announced his memoirs, which apparently never appeared. In a "prologue" printed there, David claims that he feels his death is approaching. The Nuremberg correspondent from and for Germany reported on March 3, 1813, citing unspecified sources from Berlin, that David had died in Minsk, Belarus. This is plausible insofar as thousands of civilians took part in the Russian campaign with the Great Army and many of them died of hunger, cold and disease in the winter of 1812/13 while retreating.

In a certificate from the magistrate of Bayreuth on January 12, 1831, it is stated that Lange was "serving as an army officer in the Imperial French Army, and has been missing in Russia since the French campaign in 1812". The "death of Herr Hofrath Lange" could not be proven with a "legal death certificate". This is the only officially guaranteed reference to the death of Samson Alexander David so far. His wife C (K) aroline Helene Friederike Lange died after research by the Bayreuth City Archives on December 30, 1848 at the age of 81. She was impoverished and had received alms since January 1813, most recently at 54 kreuzers a week. Her daughter, Cäcilie, married a landowner Dumont in Brussels in 1831.

literature

• Alexander Daveson (d. I. SA David): Directory of art objects that are to be had (...) , Braunschweig 1776
• Anonymous (diS A. David): About Switzerland and the Swiss , Berlin 1795.
• Alexander Daveson (d. I. SA David): About Lessing's monument . In: August von Hennings: Genius of the time . 1796 (therein David's personal memories of Lessing).
• Karl Julius Lange (d. I. SA David): Envoy murder under Karl V .: A contribution to the history of international law in the 16th century . Hamburg 1799.
• Karl Julius Lange (d. I. SA David): reflections on the five peace treaties , Altona 1802.
• Karl Julius Lange (d. I. SA David): The Chronicle. A journal . Hamburg 1802.
• Karl Julius Lange (d. I. SA David): The Nordic Mercury. A journal of historical, political and literary content . Berlin 1805.
• Karl Julius Lange (d. I. SA David): The Telegraph. A journal of the latest war events . Berlin 1806-1808.
• Peter Jungblut: A devilish life. Simson Alexander David - Career of an enemy image , epubli Berlin 2012 ( ISBN 978-3-8442-2225-8 )
• Ders .: a devilish life. Simson Alexander David (1755 - 1812) - the journalist Germany wished to hell , Berlin 2015 (2nd edition), ISBN 978-3-7375-4423-8
• Simson Alexander David . In: Manfred Asendorf, Rolf von Bockel (eds.): Democratic ways. CVs from five centuries . A lexicon. JB Metzler, Stuttgart, Weimar 1997, pp. 123-124. ISBN 3-476-01244-1 (short biography).
• Johann Georg Meusel: The learned Germany or lexicon of the now living German writers . Lemgo 1810 (there biographical outline).
• Hans-Heinrich Ebeling : The Jews in Braunschweig . Braunschweig 1987.
• Ulrich Wyrwa: Jews in Tuscany and Prussia in comparison . London 2003.
• From Alexander Daveson's early days . In: Michael . Vol. 2, 1973, p. 61 ff.

supporting documents

1. ↑ on alternative spellings see: Hans-Werner Engels: David, Simon Alexander . In: Franklin Kopitzsch, Dirk Brietzke (Hrsg.): Hamburgische Biographie . tape 1 . Christians, Hamburg 2001, ISBN 3-7672-1364-8 , pp. 79 .
2. ↑ Date of birth to Hamburg and Altona , Vol. 4, Issue 12, p. 224. Since David worked there, the date appears credible. Other sources mention November 13, 1755 or 1753, cf. Peter Jungblut: A demonized life , Berlin 2015, 2nd edition, p. 395
3. ↑ so the information in the journal Hamburg and Altona , vol. 4 / issue 12, vol. 1802, p. 224
4. ↑ Michael , Vol. 2/1973, p. 61
5. ↑ cit. according to Lessing, GE: all writings , vol. 12, Berlin 1840, p. 550
6. ↑ cf. Gothaische learned newspapers , issue 14 from February 19, 1791, p. 144
7. ↑ cf. Gothaische learned newspapers , 51st of June 29, 1791, p. 491
8. ↑ cf. Raßdörfersche Chronik in the city archive Schweinfurt HA 121, p. 8 f.
9. ↑ Ilse Jahn and Fritz. G. Lange (Ed.): The youth letters of Alexander von Humboldt 1787-1799 . Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1973, p. 399 .
10. ↑ Schiller National Edition , Vol. 41 / I., P. 160, there Long letter to Schiller of February 25, 1795
11. ^ Advertisement of David in the New Teutschem Merkur , Vol. 3 (1795), p. 319
12. ↑ cf. Enderlein: The imperial city of Schweinfurt during the last decade of its imperial immediacy with comparative views of the present: from urban sources , Schweinfurt 1863, p. 35 f.
13. ↑ [1]
14. ↑ cit. according to Telegraph , No. 1 of October 17, 1806, p. 2
15. ↑ cit. based on Revue contemporaine , 19th year 1868, p. 459
16. ↑ Plon, Henri et al. a. (ed.): Correspondance de Napoleon premier , Vol. 18, Paris 1865, p. No. 14694
17. ^ Nemesis, Zeitschrift für Politik und Geschichte , Vol. 2 (1814), p. 446
18. ↑ Bayreuth City Archives, E. No. 1555
19. ^ David family tree